Simple Words: Thinking About What Really Matters in Life

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Summary: Simple things mean a lot...
Review: Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz, perhaps best known for his multi-volume translation of and commentary upon the Talmud (currently being published in both Hebrew and English, as well as a few other languages), has put together a wonderfully simple, small, thought-provoking book of spiritual wisdom that promises the careful reader insight into new ways to think, feel, act, and be.

Steinsaltz has worked with Talmudic literature (to a very extensive and intimate degree), as well as Hasidic tales and liturgies, and having absorbed the teachings and spirit of this body of literature, has distilled it into simple, useful bits for reflection and illumination.

Deceptively simple words, which embrace huge concepts -- nature, good, family, friends, death, God, faith, love -- these are words we use all the time. But what do they really mean? 'Rabbi Steinsaltz explores some of the meanings of these powerful words that are so central to our lives. He transforms each word into a gem, turning it this way, then that, examining it to see more clearly its brilliant facets and what lies behind them.'

Perhaps the key to Steinsaltz's way of looking at these terms and concepts is to emphasise the fluid, malleable character -- these are not concepts that are set in stone; their meaning changes as our lives change, as our society changes -- the wisdom from the past must be used as a guide for understanding, but our lives in the present have validity too. That having been said, we owe our ancestors as well as our descendants a debt to carry on the line of tradition in some ways, lest we dishonour our ancestors and rob our descendants of their inheritance.

This is a difficult balance, not always the same for each person.

Steinsaltz also examines elements of our present culture in unique ways. In his chapter on Hollywood, he discusses Hollywood in terms of being a dreamworld, and a religion that deserves the appellation of being opiate of the masses. 'Being a very self-satisfied religion, Hollywood is not revolutionary; it is even anti-revolutionary. For one thing, Hollywood does not try to change norms, and certainly does not have the presumption to steer them; it merely reflects existing ones.... Hollywood glorifies the status quo, or at least promotes the dreams of Middle America as the best of all possible worlds, and thereby diminishes the possibility for change.'

Steinsaltz concludes by a frank and interesting discussion on God, in which he argues for a removal of limitations on God, and a greater understanding of just what it is we are saying when we use the word 'God'. God is, in present culture, often depicted in mostly poetic terms. 'Poetry is wonderful, but we should not expect God to conform to our images. Yet we do. For many people, the image of God is quite clear: a big, white-bearded man sitting on a throne very high in the sky. He has--at least figuratively--a stick in one hand, and a bag of candy in the other, bestowing each on His subjects.'

Alas, this is this picture of God most grow up with, and when they in their adolescence or adulthood jettison the image, they jettison God along with it, because they have not been taught more compelling ways to think about God.

Ultimately, this is a book (in great Talmudic style) of opening up the realm of questioning, rather than providing answers. In much the same way that a literate person, when confronting a page of writing in a foreign language, will recognise it as writing, and perhaps attempt to decipher it, a person with no literacy or no knowledge of the concept of writing will merely see designs or smudges on a page, and look no further. One has to have the framework for a question before one can answer it, and look for the meanings in the foreign writing.

A very simple book, a very short book (only 200 small-format pages), the wisdom in this book is timeless and invaluable for all, regardless of your religious (or non-religious) orientation.

Rating:
Summary: excelent
Review: Really makes you appreciate the importance of simple words in life.

Rating:
Summary: Extraordinary work
Review: This is a book by a wise man, mystic, scholar. Accessible ruminations about nature, God, love, even masks. I wouldn't have picked it up, because the title seemed so bland, but I saw his name on the cover and knew it wouldn't be bland or simplistic at all, and it wasn't. He looks at life's dilemmas and makes some practical and non-tendentious comments about how to look at life. No preaching here.